Star Dreadnought
The first warship of the heavy or super heavy category fielded by the Terran Alliance, the Dreadnought was among the most heavily armoured ships ever built. Intended to take full advantage of stronger Tritanium armor these ships were built with a massive four pointed ramming prow. The intent was to let it smash through formations of Kavarian Kilo class ships or -potentially- land a crippling blow to a Dominion Ascendancy. Unlike later heavy or super heavy cruisers the Terran star Dreadnoughts relied extensively on mass driver weaponry as a result of experience in previous wars. Their kinetic weapons alone were enough to engage and destroy a squadron of attack cruisers simultaneously. Only two ships are believed to have been built and both were lost in a covert operation attempting to liberate Kavarian space from the Dominion occupation. History When the Dominion began to field the Ascendancy class during their early conflicts with the Terrans there was an immediate demand for an equivalent heavy warship. This helped to kick start several programs which eventually led to the Anchorage class and the Heavy Explorer but more immediately to the Dreadnought. Unlike many other Terran designs of the era Dreadnought was to be built solely for combat. No consideration was given to possible peacetime usage, as far as the design teams were concerned this ship was going to win wars and nothing else. Numerous ceasefires and attempts at peace negotiations with the many disparate Houses of the Dominion gradually made Dreadnought an unpopular project among the Terran government. Elements of the military also began to press for discontinuation of development, supporting increased production of larger carriers like the LTSC. After House Kharbos overthrew the Ruling House and established a new dynasty it was quick to sign treaties with the Terran Alliance. With the constraints of a peace time economy the Terran government was eventually forced to pull funding. Construction on the lead ship of the class was halted only months before the Dominion launched an invasion of the Kavarian Imperium. As Kavarian space was systematically captured and occupied there was growing concern about the threat the Dominion would later pose. Under the guise of scrapping the ship Dreadnought was secretly relocated to a black operations shipyard. Dreadnought and its sister ship were both completed in secret and were used to support the Iratar led resistance effort. There are few details available on their deployment. Both ships and their fleets are known to have inflicted severe losses on House fleets, leaving few survivors. Eventually they were tracked down and destroyed through attrition tactics and superior numbers. Despite their victory it is not one that was celebrated within the Dominion. While the ships were lost along with their combat data, production data from Dreadnought was used in the development of the Pinnacle class Super Heavy Cruiser two centuries later. Size While considered a Super Heavy warship in its day it now falls within the heavy cruiser category. The exact size of the Dreadnought in unknown but that hasn't stopped many from speculating. Some analysts place the lower end around 7km in length, while others continue to insist the vessel must have been anywhere from 8 to 12 kilometers in length. Urban legends among both Human and Kavarian populations have continued to inflate both the size of the ships and devastation they inflicted. Many of these fictitious versions that have appeared in stories over the centuries since share little similarity to the actual ships. Category:Ships Category:Starships Category:Legacy Ships Category:Terran Alliance Category:Heavy Cruisers